Nursing is a profession where collaboration and collective thought are imperative to positive patient outcomes. (Maxwell, B., 2009). Teaching students how to communicate and how to collaborate to problem solve and enhance critical thinking is a large part of my role as a nursing educator.
Recently, I taught a pharmacology course for an RN-BSN program. The students were required to work as teams and present a category of medications. The students involved were all licensed staff nurses, all except for one was married with children, and only two of the 10 students worked at the same institution. I was disappointed in their presentations.
The disappointment stemmed from the obvious observation that the presentation content was divided in half, and each member of the "team" worked on their part, with minimal collaboration. In some cases, it was clear the partners did not communicate on the topic of the presentation, as they presented seemingly unrelated content. Powerpoint was used by every team, and several had different slide organization and design.
Once the presentations concluded, I voiced my concern. The students joined forces and relayed that is was unrealistic for them to get together outside of class, due primarily to time and travel distance. Some even claimed that work schedules made phone contact difficult. While I do not accept this as an excuse, and think the effort should have reflected the importance of the topics, wikis would offer a great solution to devoid the students' responses to my observations.
Students using wikis could dialogue at their convenience, with a record of conversations that is much easier to follow than email. Versions could be viewed and edited, with each partner having access to the others work in order to model content, tone, slide design etc.,. Wikis would offer a no excuse not to collaborate environment for that class assignment.
Similarly, I would love to assign my associate degree seeking students case studies to work on collaboratively and then ask them to provide a collective report. Using case studies where there is no "correct" answer, is frustrating to students but an excellent method to get them to think creatively and critically. My associate degree students are all commuters, so again, collaboration outside of class is challenging. Additionally, due to my large class size, many students complete the program and do not even know many of the members of their class. They tend to align with a few "friends" and stay in that clique throughout the program. I'd like to design a wiki containing a case study, history, manifestations and student resources etc., and have the students work in small groups to answer questions and come to conclusions as a group. A wiki would allow me to monitor their participation level, and hopefully see the progression in their decision making. This would also allow them to work with students outside of their comfort relationships, and potentially add new value perspectives. At a minimum, they would have an opportunity to communicate with a variety of people, as they will need to as nurses. Lastly, I think they'd like it.
Finally, I want to use a wiki to house final examination review content. The course management tool we use currently (CAMS) is adequate, but it is unorganized. The students, I am confident, would appreciate a single source, for review information. I would post things like my ABG-Knovio presentation, a variety of online videos I use in class to demonstrate principles like chest tube management, IV rate calculations etc., links to articles used throughout the semester, maybe even a FAQ section for the questions I always get from students. While I am not a huge proponent of narrowly defining "what will be on the final", it is an opportunity for me to provide an organized location for the students to review supplemental materials.
Personal Thoughts for Using Wikis
Recently, I taught a pharmacology course for an RN-BSN program. The students were required to work as teams and present a category of medications. The students involved were all licensed staff nurses, all except for one was married with children, and only two of the 10 students worked at the same institution. I was disappointed in their presentations.
The disappointment stemmed from the obvious observation that the presentation content was divided in half, and each member of the "team" worked on their part, with minimal collaboration. In some cases, it was clear the partners did not communicate on the topic of the presentation, as they presented seemingly unrelated content. Powerpoint was used by every team, and several had different slide organization and design.
Once the presentations concluded, I voiced my concern. The students joined forces and relayed that is was unrealistic for them to get together outside of class, due primarily to time and travel distance. Some even claimed that work schedules made phone contact difficult. While I do not accept this as an excuse, and think the effort should have reflected the importance of the topics, wikis would offer a great solution to devoid the students' responses to my observations.
Students using wikis could dialogue at their convenience, with a record of conversations that is much easier to follow than email. Versions could be viewed and edited, with each partner having access to the others work in order to model content, tone, slide design etc.,. Wikis would offer a no excuse not to collaborate environment for that class assignment.